


Where Only Devils Dare Tread

by sabriel75



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Canon Related, F/M, Gen, Kissing, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-11
Updated: 2013-11-11
Packaged: 2017-12-31 14:04:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 9,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1032556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabriel75/pseuds/sabriel75
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Coming home for Derek doesn't feel like a coming home until he arrives at the threshold of Lydia Martin's Home for Wayward Souls and discovers that he has had a soul this whole time despite everything his uncle and Kate Argent would have him believe.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Beacon Hills

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Patchcat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Patchcat/gifts).



> There are multiple trigger topics mentioned in this story, and if you have watched Teen Wolf you will have been privy to all of them as I have only transplanted all of the "bad things" that could trigger a person from the show to this story.
> 
> If you want details, skip down to my end notes. I list out everything there.
> 
> For the record, if you cannot tell after reading this story, I claim no real knowledge of Special Task Forces or of how the FBI works or how a crack prosecution team would work in prepping witnesses and/or building their case.
> 
> Do hope patchcat that you don't mind where the Human!AU story took me, because this isn't fluffy and yet it isn't quite as dark as I originally thought it would turn out. In it you should find that Stiles is a BAMF even though Allison is probably more of one. His cat, Abbadon is a ginger white fluff ball and I did find a cat wrestling a penguin video for good reference. Do hope you like how both quotes from your prompts have found their way into this story while not really actually leading the story. Mostly, I worked off the all human prompt and imagined what they would be like without the supernatural. Shocker of all shocks, they aren't much different in this universe at all nor are their stories.

Derek passed the Beacon Hills’ City sign at least 50 times. He kept coming back ‘round to it though, despite his instinctive urge to keep driving on by, to just keep driving right into the ocean. 

Five years of therapy still has not prepared him for this coming home trip. 

It doesn’t feel like coming home and Derek accepts his fate as haphazardly as the siding on his old home. His [childhood home](http://9bytz.com/mike-doyles-abandoned-lego-houses/) still standing, barely – rotted and ruined through and through – and condemned. Derek supposes if his insides could be gutted with such perfect precision as this house has been, they’d look the same. 

He feels the ground sway and catches himself on the porch stairs, nearly falling through to the muddy depths below it. He focuses hard on the shadowed area, willing it to swallow him whole. 

He cannot do this. 

His uncle wants revenge. Derek does too. He needs this moment of truth, and hopes to whatever deity wandering about; the one that has given him this chance, that the truth truly does set you free; because Derek doesn’t believe. His faith extends only as far as the cell phone in his pocket and the unerring hate that tethers him to it. 

Peter Hale has taunted him long enough. 

Derek tries not to hate his uncle, but they both struggle with control. A living reminder of all that he’s lost did nothing to aid Derek’s fight for sanity in the wake of the burning, but Peter’s blaming gaze whenever he thought his nephew wasn’t looking pushed Derek back years and probably is one of the largest contributing factors to his extended stay at St. Francis after they treated his burns. 

This fight will not happen if Derek doesn’t get up, doesn’t get off his knees in supplication to fates he has no control over, as if any of his other cries for help have ever been heard. 

That’s the catch though; he survived when no one else did, didn’t he? 

Their cries fill his ears at night, right on the cusp of sleep. They fill his ears now, when he’s half steeped in memories hanging onto reality with the last threads of hope seeping out of his fingers into the very ruin that houses the ashes of their remains. 

How do they expect him to face the killer when he considers himself a partner in crime? 

“Dude, you’re too heavy to be on those stairs. They’re going to give any minute and by the way… you’re destroying evidence in an on-going arson investigation.”

Derek’s face is streaked with tears and his knees are locked up, but he isn’t giving the smart-assed police brat the satisfaction of seeing his face until he’s good and ready to show it. He wipes gingerly across his eyes because he’s covered in soot, even the sleeves of his shirt are contaminated and gently eases himself into standing. He doesn’t turn though. He concentrates on the house, remembering it as it was while he harnesses the anger building; knowing if he doesn’t, his ass will get thrown in jail for punching an officer of the law on police-confiscated property even if the land deed bears his name. 

“Can you read?” Oh the tone has definitely slipped into something harsher, more authoritative. Derek recognizes this shift but he doesn’t care. He’s almost in control enough to deal with this pushy piece of shit. 

“The police tape tacked up in a definitive border around this house should’ve been a dead giveaway to stay off the property.” 

“Yeah, but it’s my property so I think you’ll have a hard time making the trespassing charge stick, officer… “ Derek trails off, his rant coming up short when the decidedly not-a-police-officer rapidly blinks in surprise, his camera snapping photos like the paparazzi. 

“You’re Derek Hale.” 

It isn’t a question and Derek’s irate that he’s becoming a snapshot for some paper out there that has no idea what the true story is. 

“Put your camera down before I fucking smash it into oblivion,” Derek says, stalking the journalist, maybe? He can’t be sure because whoever _he_ is, he looks about seventeen, barely legal to be out of school. A truant highschooler more likely with a morbid fascination and that does set Derek’s teeth on edge. 

“What the hell are you doing on my property at 10 am in the morning, shouldn’t you be in school?” 

“Hold up there, Hale! A minute ago you thought I was a police officer, now you’re accusing me of being a truant? Haha man. No one told me what a riot you are! Do you ever get off the crazy train?” 

Too far… Derek pulls the punch and misses the camera but gets the juvenile delinquent right between the eyes. He staggers back from the force, blood running a bit freely from his nose but less than what Derek expected. “You’re an asshole who should not be here.” 

The kid’s eyes are both turning black and that’s not good. It means Derek didn’t hold back as much as he had hoped to when packing the wallop; but it doesn’t keep the truant from replying nasally, “You’re the asshole,” as he pulls an ID wallet from his back pocket. 

“Special Agent Stilinski… Stiles. Since my dad’s the Sheriff, I go by Stiles,” Stiles explains haughtily, smugly, gurgly… and Derek ignores him to verify that all Stiles’ moles match the photo, checking his eye color too and getting in Stiles’ personal bubble like the asshole he’s been accused of being. He’s not an idiot and teens today have access to some of the best technology for faking IDs. 

Stiles puts out a hand to steady himself, flinching when he comes into contact with Derek, like it physically hurts him to touch Derek and he pushes himself upright too quick. And Derek catches on too late to keep the blackness fading out the bright gold-brown of Stiles’ eyes but he does keep him from face-planting into the ground after the panic robs Stiles of all his ability to breath on his own.


	2. Sheriff Stilinski

Sadly as much as he would like his son to have a better first introduction to Derek, he cannot regret how it went down. His son isn’t violent but he has a mouth that he’ll use like a weapon and he hit every single one of Derek’s hot buttons willingly. 

Derek needs the practice if he is going to take the stand. 

What he survived in off-the-cuff comments from his son is nothing near what the cross-examination will be like for him. 

Derek’s looks will work against him. He does not look like a victim and he’s a looming presence in comparison to almost everyone walking the planet even if he’s about the same height as his son – his son who has already cataloged that trait, along with the color of Derek’s eyes, the quickness of his reflexes and his muscled torso while sporting a bloody, broken nose and trying to suppress a panic attack. 

Stiles refuses to press charges too.

Which is smart because while Beacon Hills is a small town and they will all know Derek punched Stiles; they will all know the history there and how much Stiles can push a person without physical contact. 

His son might be the Force’s pride and joy, but he can piss off the best of them when he’s in a panic. He’s paranoid as hell and doesn’t let anything go for the love of God and yet those traits makes him the rookie who holds the national record for solving cold case files and an FBI favorite when they need help profiling the highly deranged. 

Stiles finds the patterns in anomalies. 

What he cannot make fit into neat circles and geometrics become bends and skewed shapes that by some weird fit come together and form whole pictures. 

His son’s a freaking genius criminologist and he wonders where he went wrong. Why the artistic genius he prayed his son would inherit from his mother’s genetics presented instead as some maniacal anxiety-driven understanding of motivations, machinations of humanity and what he finds, how he reads human behavior, the human mind is as something rare, twisted and most certainly the darkest, most wicked thing to inhabit the universe. 

The Sheriff needs a drink or two and a day off. 

He goes to find Derek, to put the poor man out of his misery instead. Stiles really did look dead to the world when Derek brought him into the ER if Melissa is to be believed and well... it only took one look to see these two boys are already smitten. The Sheriff thinks it's a good match especially since he knows Lydia will tire of Derek quickly once she figures out he's got a steel core that just needed polishing and Allison and Stiles will take over finishing him up for the stand.

Of course, the Sheriff’s not going to let him get off too easy. Derek seems like the type to settle in pretty quick and he's going to want to be on the Sheriff's good side for more reasons than his legal-aged son… who really is an officer of the law.


	3. Lydia Martin's Home for Wayward Souls

Derek balks at the door entry when Lydia Martin, the voice matches but the face – she looks even younger than Stiles does.

“Lydia Martin's Home for Wayward Souls, please come in Derek Hale,” she says politely but there’s an undertone of menace and Derek’s still shaking from the Sheriff’s chastisement so the thought of another lecture freezes him in place. 

“Does no one in this town look their age even though you all sound old enough or at least talk a good talk because yeah… I cannot believe Stiles is 22, nearly 23 which makes you what…?”

Lydia owns the bevy of apartments created from a gutted, auction-foreclosed Victorian home in Beacon Hills. She has to be older than Stiles, given the info Dr. Deaton has on her too. A PhD of Chemistry from Cal-Tech and no matter what kind of genius she is, there’s no way she’s made it through the doctorate program in only five years. Right? Derek might have overestimated logic when he thought that thought.

Lydia’s giving him a brisk once-over and it is obvious Derek has been found lacking. 

“It is impolite to ask a lady her age,” Lydia responds primly and turns on her high-heeled-covered toes while making some finger gesture that looks like she’s flipping Derek off and commanding him to follow. 

He heels – follows like a domesticated dog while muttering, “Everyone here is barking mad!” And realizes he may have just insulted himself when one of Lydia’s elegantly arched eyebrows raises in mocking query at him and he meets her steely gaze.

“We do not speak of mental health in such a negative manner here. Everyone here might come across a little intense [Derek snorts and shakes his head disbelievingly which does nothing to rid himself of the dog comparisons.] and Lydia straightens up tall and imposing despite her tiny frame of a core and stares Derek down. 

“You know what? Let us spare me of your complaints about how your day has been littered [Can she read minds because how is she now contributing to Derek’s dog characteristics?] with people smarter than you, younger than you and frankly better looking than you; and how they have made your life miserable because you chose violence rather than using your words like human folk do.” 

She jerks her head ever so slightly as though she’s wound tight and her lips are pressed together firm enough to pucker and she looks adorably naïve and yet fierce enough to scratch Derek’s eyes out if he steps another foot out of line. 

She’d make a good dominatrix and Derek has no idea where that thought sprang from but his imagination leaps immediately to Stiles spread out on his bed, taking his orders and suddenly Derek’s posture comes with a lot more stiffness. 

“Alright, lead on then,” he manages and she finally starts the tour. 

As they go through the hallway, she points out communal rooms and three sets of staircases. The ladies take the far right and the gents take the far left. Some couples do co-habitat but he’ll figure out those dynamics soon enough. 

They go towards the middle stairs, which lead directly into a huge dining area. In back towards the left is a kitchen. There’s a huge serving window with a gate grill pulled halfway up. Two cups set on the outer side of the island area connected to the window ledge. 

Lydia picks them both up and goes to hand Derek one, “Here you go, Americana… with an extra shot of Espresso. It’s your drink of choice according to Peter, your uncle, yes?” She does not look amused and he knows she knows that his uncle purposefully gave asshole responses when Lydia called him as a reference. 

Such petty meanness is typical of Peter and yet, Derek still seethes that he’s having to grit out a “No, actually it isn’t. My uncle lies for the fun of it, if it means making my life miserable.” 

“Good thing then that I called your therapist. Here… drink it. Green tea sweetened with agave nectar. Anyone who has a body sculpted like yours does not drink coffee for relaxation. Stiles might be the human behavior expert, but I am no fool. 

“Also your uncle is an asshole and you should probably think of breaking the bonds that tie as soon as possible. He could be a liability to you in this case.” 

“Your therapist agrees,” Lydia catches him before he can protest, “He knows all about today and I have promised him that you will call him as soon as you are settled. He broke no patient privileges by speaking to me since I am one of the expert witnesses in your trial and we have been working with him long before bringing you in to testify. 

“Also, he is quite familiar with Stiles’ brand of crazy when he is carving out a case, especially in this particular one.” 

Derek drops into one of the dining room chairs. His arms ache and he wants to go to his rooms, not be subjected to Lydia’s cross-examinations and he plops his head down on the table and rests. 

Lydia scoots into a chair beside him, probably in the most lady-like, proper way ever and Derek should care how bad his manners are in the face of her impeccable ones but he hasn’t the energy left in him. 

“Why does everyone around here act like they are personally invested in my case?” He asks tiredly without looking up, only turning his face out now so he looks up at Lydia instead of the table. “Am I missing something?” 

“You are, but the major missing piece is not my story to tell. Instead why don’t I talk about Stiles, your new crush-worthy flatmate?” 

“What?! … No… No… I can’t share with him,” Derek says, suddenly finding the adrenaline rush of fear and embarrassment enough to get him sitting up straight. 

“Ah, there you go. There is the good posture I expect of you,” Lydia says blissfully unapologetic because she continues on, “You share the same floor but there are walls dividing your living space from his and the spiral staircases that lead upstairs and out to the balcony. Although the balcony outside is a shared space without partitions. 

“You will survive, but expect for some pretty intense ribbing from us all. Erica and Isaac will be the worse, but Scott and Allison will gut you if you hurt him. I will cut your corpse up into teeny, tiny pieces and throw you out to sea so that anything you saw on _Dexter_ seems kindness in comparison. Capisce?” 

“Dr. Deaton said you all would be good for me, that I would be safe here and that this home would be a great place for starting over,” Derek whines, he can hear the distinctive petulance he slips into his speech. He’s so tired. 

Lydia picks up on it because she switches tactics. She gets up to grab two meals, hamburgers and fries and they smell delicious now that Derek’s finally processing senses beyond the shock of the morning, and places one of the plates in front of Derek before settling again at the table with her own. 

They eat in silence, except for the sound of Lydia’s knife… she’s eating her burger and fries with a knife and fork, clinking them together too infrequently to grate on Derek’s nerves thankfully.

She finishes before him though and begins again without his permission. He was enjoying the quiet but he says nothing because she finally gets to the part he wanted to hear. 

“The first three cold case files Stiles solved were arsons. Some trigger device never used before but Stiles found ashen bits, just solid enough to photograph and then replicate in the lab. He might not believe he’s cut out for mechanical engineering or chemistry but he knows enough to be dangerous and to set Scott or myself on the right path or to tell us where we are doing it wrong and start over. He is such a head case, but he is a smart head case who should be trusted. 

“Even when he attracts darkness. Those three – Allison and Scott who you haven’t met and Stiles— they pick up strays with such horrible pasts and they let the darkness surround their hearts as if their pasts and past experiences don’t make them prone to pain and dark places too. You’d never know it though. They shine their way out of things brilliantly. Naively, yes, and messily, yes, but brilliantly too… every single time.” 

She gives Derek an assessing look, arms folded and she meets his eyes as if to ascertain if he is listening and he is because Lydia is the most brilliant of the lot and she’s praising Scott, Allison and Stiles. 

“Like I said, we listen to Stiles especially when he becomes attracted to something dark, because it either means he’s going to get hurt badly or make the most spectacular find of his career. 

“He doesn’t talk about it, and he did see a psychologist about it, but his last sting operation, he was used as bait. Jailbait. Oh I know all about your past but you’re going to listen to me Derek Hale.” 

Derek’s body jerks and he has the urge to run, but he cannot. He has to hear this, because he has had years to get over this knee-jerk reaction and it is someone else’s story, Stiles’ story and he already knows if he ever has the chance to strangle the life out of the man/woman who hurt Stiles, he just might do it. And that’s weird, because Derek has always been angry for himself when he has heard stories of other people’s lives but never actually been able to allow himself to feel for them too. 

He doesn’t do empathy much if the story comes too close to his own, but also, because he doesn’t deserve to claim victimization, doesn’t deserve to share in their sorrow or pain when he is the cause of his own situation. 

And that’s not right either. He was a victim. He was a victim. It is not his fault. It is not his fault. 

He is breathing deeply, in and out, using his meditation techniques to keep himself from losing it. He would do push-ups if he thought Lydia believed those would help and he finds himself surprised when she does say, “You’re going to listen but do whatever you need to do to keep yourself calm and remind yourself… You were a victim. You are not to blame.” 

When he gets himself into a groove and his breathing evens out, Lydia apologizes, “I am really sorry for how some of this will be triggery making you feel like you’re reliving the hell you already lived, but we have to start somewhere. Dr. Deaton believes you already have developed empathy for Stiles and I see it, you have, so we’re starting here. 

“Give me permission to go on Derek. I will not push this talk on you but you know it has to happen sometime,” Lydia asks. 

He nods. He wants to hear this story and he doesn’t want to hear this story. But he nods again this time, more sure than anything that he wants to know everything about Stiles that he can. 

“Stiles lived through it and he was paid to be in that position so not exactly the same thing as your situation. Consent in this business parks right on the barrier of dubious and non-consensual though; because there is so much more than our egos, pride and personal emotional damage at stake that can any of us really say no and feel like good people afterwards? 

“And it was this particular case, as we untied his wired wrists…” and Lydia’s voice goes hard even as her eyes water “… Omigod, he bled all over Allison and she cried and he still has some scarring. We were afraid he had nerve damage in his right thumb… and that would’ve ended his field agent career, but it was that case that gave him his Kate Argent epiphany. He figured out her brother probably knew more than he was letting on. He had Chris and Gerard brought in and he grilled them himself. They gave up a lot more information than they wanted and Gerard Argent got in a few well-aimed punches before the other agents could separate him from Stiles and it was such a mess of limbs, confessions and raids but Stiles knew he would find evidence that linked Kate Argent back to the Hale house if he kept searching. So before you let your punching rage out again, remember the last person you beat up is your own personal Jesus.”

And with that rebuke, she breaks down into tears. 

Derek stares stupidly before patting her softly on the back, shhing her like a mother hen while wondering if he is going to survive this trial.  This trial that obviously means a whole lot to a whole lot of people who are not Hales, but who are just as heavily invested in making sure Kate Argent is brought to justice. 


	4. Melissa McCall

She and Stiles have a history of being in the hospital together, at the same time, most of the time when shit hits the fan.

She’s collected the people in her son’s life with hesitancy and suspicion but this budding family of hers and Scott’s includes Stiles, has included Stiles from the beginning, for the longest. 

And she and Stiles are always the most protective with her babies, her adopted-in-spirit darlings. So it is no surprise, the stab of sharp pain and anger she feels when she sees him carrying Stiles into the ER. Because of course she is there when Derek “Hulk” Hale brings in a limp, bleeding Stiles. 

She is the first to ask, “What happened?” and the first to see Derek stammer out a confession, which makes her want to punch him in the face.

She doesn’t because Stiles, Scott, Allison and even Lydia are teaching her she needs to forgive. Not forget, because that’s disastrous and you cannot build a case against the bad guy if you forget, but you have to forgive. 

Instead she checks Stiles’ vitals and makes Derek carry him the whole time while she looks for an open gurney to lay him on. And once he’s laid out on it, she tells Derek to go wait in the waiting room and that she’ll send the Sheriff out once he’s been back to check on Stiles. 

She doesn’t tell Derek that he could potentially be facing fines or jail time for punching an officer of the law and she doesn’t laugh when Stiles blinks slowly up at her and grabs her arm, pulling her towards him and hissing, “Don’t let him say anything.” 

She does smack Stiles’ fist and tells him, “You’re an idiot,” before getting a bowl of warm water to clean his face up with. He smiles dopily up at her like he already knows she knows Derek’s guilty but won’t say anything. 

“You should press charges just to pay him back.” 

“For what?” Stiles asks, his face serious and his brows furrowed in judgment. “It’s not his fault his family was attacked the same night… the same night my mom passed away. Life sucks that way. You know that Ms. McCall.” 

“Yeah, well you didn’t use to be this forgiving, Stiles.” 

“Yeah, well whose fault is that? You keep telling me…,” 

“Shut up Stiles. Your nose is bleeding again.” 

And she knows that she and Stiles will always place some of the fault that the Sheriff wasn’t here to say goodbye to his wife and hold his desperate son…  against that night, and they especially blame Kate Argent and her conniving father and her uncooperative brother. 

And she also, will forever keep Stiles’ secret, that in his sorrow-fuelled rampage he had blamed everyone that night – the police force for always needing his father, his father for always putting his job before his family; Derek Hale who survived and required police escort across city lines to go to St. Francis where they could treat his burns and also, his mind which had been scrambled by guilt and a sociopath who abused innocents; and even her, the nurse who was always there and didn’t tell them once how little time they had left with each other.

Which is why she hugs him hard when he gasps at the appearance of his dad running towards him and says, “Geesh, it’s a bloody nose, nothing more,” and knows that it’s so much more but they’re pleading the fifth.


	5. Derek's No Good, Horrible Day Until It Was The Best Day Ever

Derek’s put together his bed, moved his furniture into place, unpacked his bags and the ten or twelve boxes he had shipped from Peter’s and situated all his belongings so it feels like home. And it does feel like home, like a forever home. How— after only a few hours after arriving he knows he’ll never want to leave this place, he cannot explain, but he accepts it. 

Isaac and Scott both came bustling over, fetching him after he calmed Lydia down and she texted them the interrogation was over. He has passed Lydia’s trial #1 but she explained sadly she could not promise there would not be more. It is their job to toughen him up, so he can face the jury, face the judge, but most importantly face Kate Argent and release the truth of what led up to that night – the night his parents and siblings were lost to him forever. 

It’s a loss he never expected to survive much less get vengeance for and he is growing stronger and stronger in his conviction to fight back each minute he breathes air that’s given freely and space given without resentment. He had not realized how suffocating Peter’s silent but apparent judgment had been. 

The boys – [They act like puppies and Derek’s dismayed at how much he views life as though he is a member of a dog pack.] – Scott and Isaac had offered to help, but he had told them, “No, he was fine doing it on his own.” And now lying on his bed, he finds that sleeping isn’t going to happen soon even though he usually was in bed by eight at Peter’s. 

“Hey, is that my sock?” Stiles asks, from behind Derek’s front door. “Abbadon, come back here, you little demon.” 

From the sound of it, there’s a scuffle and a basket, possibly a laundry basket bounces against his door and to the floor and then a thud, like a body falling. Derek is racing for the door, heart in his throat at the thought of Stiles being injured again today. 

He opens the door just as a flurry of ginger fur streaks past him and to see Stiles laid out flat on his belly, arms outstretched in an effort to grab the feline menace. His blackened eyes and bruised nose doing nothing to distract Derek from how pretty he is sprawled at Derek's feet.

“You okay?” 

Stiles growls. He growls and gets to his feet, stalking the cat, who does indeed have a sock in his mouth and is now centered on Derek’s king-size bed – literally in the middle of it where neither he nor Stiles will be able to grab the bugger without losing their balance.

“Wow! He knows how to pick the best spot for making a last stand, doesn’t he?”

“He?” Stiles looks at Derek with pity, “He is a _she_. A rare ginger-white, bushy-furred demon spawn that I love… and loathe with a passion and will never understand… Abbadon give me back my sock!” 

Stiles pounces and bounces on Derek’s bed and Abbadon, the she-devil flies up and over his shoulder with a prissy shake of her tail where she proceeds to drop the sock on the upturned laundry next to the upturned laundry basket and walks off haughtily. 

“Ha, well that went better than expected,” Stiles boasts as he rights himself before standing up and walking out. “Sorry for disturbing your peace, she’s really sweet… it’s just I’ve been gone all day and so she’s worked herself into a snit. Plus she gets irritated over being shut in all day.” 

“Please Stiles, whatever. Your demon cat goes wherever she wants. She just likes to torture you and stuffed animals and feet without socks and pretty much anything that moves,” says the girl now helping Stiles pick up his laundry and smiling at Derek with a knowing grin.

“And the parallels to the other woman in your life we will refrain from making, since she is my best friend,” the girl finishes off her mockery with a flick at the offending sock while Stiles huffily reminds her that Lydia is his best friend too and we do not compare our friends to demon spawn ever… because it is not nice. 

She is ignoring him. Instead she holds her hand out to Derek for shaking. 

“Hello Derek, I’m Allison Argent,” she says, still smiling but with a glint of question in her gaze, as if she knows she could potentially be a trigger for Derek. She’s not though. Derek’s known she was going to be here and doesn’t blame her at all. He’d take this family any day over hers. Knowing her background, he understands she probably needed this haven of a place just as much as he did. 

“Hi, it’s nice to finally put a face with the name,” and Derek shakes her hand but grins over at Stiles who is now standing with a basket full of laundry and a gaping mouth that’s quite lovely but makes him look too wonderstruck to pass as the genius he’s supposed to be. 

Lydia comes up beside him, tipping Stiles’ mouth closed with her index finger, and announcing her presence with “it’s not polite to stare or stand with your mouth open as if it could catch flies, darling.” 

“You too Derek, eyes on level and make contact with the entire group not just one person,” she advises as she walks on down the hallway with Allison, their arms linked together. Although Allison is the nicest, and swivels her head ‘round, showing off her dimpled grin, and saying before going out of hearing distance, “Bye boys, see you in the morning at breakfast.” 

Stiles waves after them, nearly dropping his laundry basket again; except Derek has quick reflexes and rights it before all the clothes tumble out. 

“Oh heh, sorry, I’m not really with it… I am so beat man,” he says tripping off towards his rooms. 

He turns and catches himself, graceful in a goofy guy kind of way, a way that highlights how flexible his body is and Derek just shakes his head in wonderment. 

“What?!” Stiles laughs off his clumsiness. “Just pretend I do that all the time and you’re already used to it, okay? 

“Seriously though, I just wanted to say, your place looks good. I hope you like it here and that Lydia didn’t scare you too badly this afternoon. She’s… she’s got a really good heart and wants to make sure Kate Argent doesn’t ever hurt anyone again. So yeah… if she didn’t say, we need you Derek. We need you to be brave.” 

And Stiles stumbles a bit more towards his rooms before Derek works up the courage to softly reply, “I really do like it here and yeah… I want to make Kate Argent pay for what she did too.”

When Stiles looks back, his smile is blinding and more sincere than anyone’s been today and he simply offers a “G’night Derek” before slipping into his own rooms and shutting the door and yet Derek can still feel the radiance of his happiness as he slips back into his own rooms and shuts his door. 

Nothing ever has felt so wonderful.


	6. Chris Argent

Chris is jealous, goddamned jealous of his daughter’s makeshift family, because that’s what they are. 

He no longer sits on a pedestal but he never thought he would be so replaceable or have to fight to prove his worth to his daughter as a father… to be her father in that way where she comes to him with questions, with her field stories or just share her experiences as an agent. He afterall carried on the family legacy with the FBI too before taking early retirement. 

And here he is again, living in the shadow of his sister. His psycho but brilliant sister who is rapidly destroying the legacy the Argent family built within the Branch. Even Victoria’s suicide, as stigmatized as it had been and convinced him to take early retirement, it was not the federal offense seducing underage students is, the evilness his sister committed by killing off witnesses with fires. And yet, his father, his crazy sociopath of a father continues to fight her case despite the obvious evidence and ignores Chris’s pleas for them to use the psych evaluation to have her hospitalized. 

He suspects his father is just as insane as his sister and that the cancer is eating away at more than his lower extremities.

The three of them will most likely all be declared certifiably insane once all the facts are revealed. Derek Hale has a good memory for dates, times and places, and is almost as accurate as Chris's daytime planner he rabidly keeps daily spanning years.

Chris hates that he can provide the reasons, the motivation for why Kate’s become unhinged and how his father revealed his true nature in the interrogation room with the Stilinski boy. No one pushed harder, more crueler and with such hate. He and Kate should never have had to survive the brutality of their own father, of Gerard; and Kate’s just as much a victim of her early childhood and he knows… he knows… he knows his little girl is in a better, safer place. 

He worries about her though. She takes risks, greater risks than any of the other agents because she has so much to prove, and yeah, Stiles is an amazing partner but his heart isn’t in it. Allison suspects that Kate’s case will be the last for him as an FBI special agent, that he will direct all his attentions to becoming the Sheriff. He wishes to follow in his father’s shoes and if that doesn’t set off all Chris’s insecurities and jealousies all over again, because his little girl is following in his footsteps not because she wants to emulate him but because she wants to bring back honor to the Argent name. 

But he’s learning to take what he can get – Allison coming by occasionally not to talk shop but to talk about her friends, her family, and about how they are getting back to normal. 

Her little makeshift family have had a rough year, between the botched sting operation where Stiles actually got the raw deal and now this, Chris turning on Allison’s grandfather and aunt. 

She says she’s proud of him and tells him repeatedly he’s doing the right thing by taking the deal and helping the prosecution in an effort to stay out of prison himself, but he can’t feel right about it. They are his family, his remaining family and all he has left even if they’re a disgrace.

Because as much as looks for himself in Allison, looks for the fierce drive that he, Kate and Gerard had hard-wired into them… he only sees kindness in his own child and isn’t sure that it will be enough to help her survive the long haul.


	7. Chapter 7

They’re having a party, all of them are and Derek has made friends outside of the house, the home… whatever… Lydia’s home for wayward souls or something like that but he doesn’t really care about them. He just wants to be around his pack. 

And hopefully he didn’t say that aloud. Derek isn’t actually sober at the moment.

It’s his first time drunk and out of control and Lydia and Stiles are laughing so hard that they’re toppled over on each other. 

Neither of them drink, but Derek doesn’t mind and understands that tee-tolling, teetotalers are a thing for a variety of reasons. 

Stiles doesn’t drink because he saw what it did to his dad after his mom died and Derek suspects also, because of the same reasons that Lydia doesn’t. Neither one of them can stand not being in complete control of themselves and the world around them at all times.

It explains why Lydia's going to leave them again. Well she left Stiles before to go to Cal-Tech while he went to UC Davis and they don't speak of that time like it was their worst nightmare. Allison, Scott and Isaac do sometimes though. Stiles and Scott found Isaac and adopted him and Lydia made him her pet from across the country. They skyped and phoned until Lydia couldn't take it any longer and damn if she didn't get her PhD in record time.

The grin on his face is probably a mix of scary goofy and proud papa, both labeled as such by the boys and Stiles. They're forever teasing Derek about his facial expressions but obviously are delighted when they discover a new one. Derek thinks it's time to pull out the "I am a suave, sexy motherfucker" one when Lydia and Stiles sort of melt into each other like they're just as tired of all the people here too.

Derek loves them so much and he saunters over to them, with a sexy gait that has Stiles blushing from the collar to the tip of his hair-line where his messily-fussed hair stands up in a very stylish, hip way. Stiles is totally a hipster out of uniform. Derek tells him that too. He loves Stiles and Lydia and how hip they are, and forgiving and kind and how welcoming they are and how life is the grandest now that they are friends. 

Stiles looks over at Lydia before pulling him up to his feet. “Let’s go loverboy,” he says, guiding Derek gently up the left flight of stairs, because the left stairs are for gents. 

He’s pretty proud he’s remembered that, what with how many shots he’s done. The words coming out of Stiles' mouth are so correct though, he is tired of the noises and the crowd and all he really wants to do now is go lie down in his own bed. 

“Not much farther,” Stiles explains, tugging Derek through the door and omigod Stiles’ demon cat has one of his stuffed animals. Actually she’s knocked all his stuffed animals out of the net hanging from the ceiling and Derek really has no idea how that cat manages some of the stunts she does, but he just isn’t up for taking on Abbadon tonight and is willing to let it go.

He doesn’t even like stuffed animals but Erica insists on bringing them home for him from work, some bowling alley slash game room slash laser tag place. She says Derek needs to learn how to cuddle, and then laughs like a madwoman. The way she laughs would probably scare Derek except that for some reason it always sets off Stiles’ blush and his blush is something to behold. He goes from gorgeous to stunning in a matter of seconds and Derek cannot help staring and forgets all about Erica’s maniacal laugh in the process. 

In the six months he’s been here, studying with Lydia and Scott while being grilled by Allison and Stiles (They’ve taken over for Lydia because she has no patience for Derek now that he’s a grown boy whatever that means.), Erica has brought him at least thirty stuffed animals so that eventually he just gave in and put them all up in one of those nets specifically designed for stuffed animals and to keep them out of the way. 

Apparently though Abbadon didn’t like them up there and is she wrestling that stuffed animal? Stiles is chasing her but she does a sideways scoot that fools him every time until he’s sideways on the bed while Derek flops on the bed perpendicular to him. 

“You think she’d hand it over to me if I used FBI interrogation tactics on her?” 

Derek rolls his eyes. “You’re always threatening to bring out the Branch secret methods to get her to behave and it hasn’t happened yet.” 

Stiles smiles before he puts a finger over his lips and whispers, “Don’t tell anybody okay, but we don’t really have special tactics. We mostly just say, ‘Stop you fucking asshole or I’ll shoot.’”

“You don’t,” Derek replies, shaking his head in a sure sign of disbelief. “Nope. I don’t believe you ever have said that.” 

“Sadly I have,” and Stiles actually looks sad that that’s the truth, but perks up when Abbadon starts tumbling over and over the stuffed animal, a penguin actually and looks like she might be bringing it over to him. 

The penguin’s nearly the size of her. She didn’t really grow full size and wow, was Derek so not surprised that Stiles’ cat is a rescue runt who wasn’t even expected to live past the day. 

But he barks out a laugh and another watching her trying to haul the penguin over to Stiles while simultaneously trying to wring its neck. Oh and maybe Derek isn’t as drunk as he thought he was because he can actually pronounce simultaneously pretty good for a drunk dude. 

“No you’re still pretty wasted, because I have no idea what you’re trying to say,” Stiles informs him before turning to his cat and demanding, [“Unhand the Penguin and no one gets hurt.”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65UFtgO97_Y) 

Abbadon stops to stare, but seriously. Derek stares at him, trying desperately not to sound mocking, but not really managing. “Did you just use your police voice on her?” 

“Yep, it works the best. See.” And Derek cannot believe his eyes, but Abbadon’s dropped the penguin and sauntered off like the miscreant of the night she is. 

“Oh that’s a good one… miscreant,” Stiles says, laughing so hard he falls off the bed. 

Derek rolls over until he can slide next to Stiles and they sit side by side against his bed, leaning into each other while leaning back so they can peer out of Derek’s skylight in his bedroom. 

He wants to know if Stiles wishes on the stars he can see from his room, identical to Derek’s except it is on the opposite side of their floor and well the belongings that fill it, because Derek does wish and does with more frequency the closer the trial gets. His wishes increasingly center around Stiles and kissing and maybe the rest of their lives. 

His fear of the future is mostly gone now that he knows he can live here for as long as he likes. Lydia has sold him the home and expects him to let the others stay for however long they like as well. He has signed the deed; he owns this house now even though Lydia’s told him not to tell anyone about their arrangement. 

She understands him and doesn’t expect him to keep it a secret for long. When Derek loves, he gives everything he has for it and he knows without a doubt, he loves Stiles. 

He loves the man in his FBI suit, which is impeccable and the only outfit that convinced Derek that Stiles could wear something other than smart-ass t-shirts under plaid collared shirts or red hoodies. 

He loves the man in his gym clothes and when he gets his ass kicked by Allison. 

He loves the man when he’s beat-dead tired, but still climbs up the spiral staircase in his rooms so he can sit by Derek while Derek searches the sky for serenity after a rough day. 

They’ve started sharing everything and even though the walls separate their rooms, they’re belongings have mixed and their best memories are always together in the communal parts of their floor or downstairs. It’s who they are, he and Stiles. They need pack and need the pack to need them back. [And the damn dog metaphors always seem so apt even now for explaining Derek’s life.]

Lydia though, she gave her heart away and hasn’t ever demanded it back. 

“Lydia’s the toughest of us all, huh?” Derek muses and Stiles turns to face him. 

“Oh so now we’re talking instead of star gazing. You sobered up fast,” and he’s looking at Derek like he knows all his secrets and Derek thinks he might. 

“She sold me this house and I’m not supposed to say anything but I think she might be going after Jackson or something stupid like that.” 

Stiles sighs softly but he doesn’t take his eyes off Derek and then he does look away, back up at the stars before shrugging, “I know the first day you arrived she used my story to draw you in, and left the rest for me to tell. So I’m going to return the favor. Anything more beyond what I tell you tonight, she will have to elaborate on, okay?” 

Derek nods right away, so different from that first day even though he still suffers pangs of fear for Stiles whenever he thinks about the story she told him that day. 

“Yeah, I got it,” he says and Stiles catches him by the chin, pulls him close so he can look directly into Derek’s eyes and asks again, “Dude, tell me you’re not drunk yesing me. I am serious. Lydia loves Jackson like a motherfucking boss but she will not ever do anything to put us in danger or herself because of that man, and I don’t want you to accidentally hurt her more by accidentally repeating what I say tonight.” 

“Have you ever noticed how everyone in this house repeats themselves? I mean,” Derek shakes his head in three quick successions, clearing out some of the wooziness lingering and continues, “We repeat the same wording in the same sentence like we’re some literary cult who is trying to force alliterative and repetition onto the masses.” 

Stiles laughs, effortless and relieved, “Okay so you’re not drunk, maybe buzzed but definitely not drunk if you can debate the merits of our mimicked speech patterns.” 

“You know, that right there, Stiles, that is why I love you. Seriously, only you and I could have this conversation,” Derek admits. 

His voice has gone husky and he’s caught in Stiles’ gaze. Not like before, not in scrutiny but in pure affectionate adoration and he doesn’t think, just blurts out, “I want to kiss you.” 

And the grin, that radiant, sincere grin that Stiles hides away until moments like these between he and Derek sets off a fit of giggles in Derek but he’s never loved like this and never wanted another person this badly before and he feels like he’s behaving juvenile and unpolished. 

Warm hands cradle his face though and Stiles blinding smile is right there and he can’t help smiling back, “You’re doing it right this time Derek. Asking is respectful and I appreciate it. So can I have that kiss now?” 

Derek pushes forward slowly, and Stiles lets him, lets him push their lips together. There is instant heat from the contact and Derek cannot get close enough, and pulls Stiles into his lap even as Stiles angles himself up so he can cover Derek’s mouth completely with his. They move together, wanting to be closer and Derek’s wrapping his arms around Stiles without pulling away and Stiles’ hands have slid into his hair. 

It feels amazing, all of it and he groans into the kiss that’s sending his nerve-endings into a happy panic. His hands sliding up and down Stiles’ back and down further to untuck his shirt from the super skinny jeans only Stiles and maybe Isaac could manage, but Derek’s brain short-circuits when Stiles slips him some tongue about the same time his hands make skin-to-palm contact. 

He’s breathless when Stiles pulls back, teasing his bottom lip with teeth and showing off some very red, puffy lips that are unbelievably pornographic. “You’re going to be the death of me,” he whispers. 

Derek smirks and pulls Stiles closer. Stiles is a head taller when he sits up for repositioning but slouches quickly after Derek situates them a little more comfortably. They mold to each other, gravitating to the warmth their arms provide. 

They stay like that for minutes, until Stiles mouths a bit at Derek’s neck, mixing wet kisses with butterfly kisses and turning Derek on so rapidly he hugs Stiles tight. 

“Even if it’s the death of us, we’re going to live right here, forever and ever,” Derek whispers decidedly not wanting to break the quiet of their moment. 

But he’s out of luck because Stiles is breaking into laughs that are going to suck away all the air he needs to kiss Derek again, and is being so obnoxious that not only does Abbadon come to see what the racket is, but so does the entire party and soon Derek’s party of two by his bed with Stiles is made up of Isaac, Scott, Allison, Boyd, Erica and Lydia. 

Derek cannot mind though, because when they all leave later, he and Stiles will make their nightly trek to the balcony and afterwards, Stiles will follow Derek back down to his rooms because he has the biggest bed afterall. 

Or that’s what Stiles promised in a whisper only for Derek’s ears before tackling Scott and starting a full on pillow fight, with a battle cry of “Boys versus Girls.” 

So Derek grabs him from behind and swings him around so he can wield two pillows at once without worry of breaking bones. And they’re going to get their asses handed to them on a platter because Erica, Lydia and Allison are the fiercest. But that doesn’t matter either because these people right here are family.


	8. Lydia Martin

Lydia watches her family, pack if she uses Derek’s term and although she protests every time he compares what they have to a dog pack, they sure act like a pile of puppies around each other.

Stiles and Derek always end up in the middle, everyone else centered around them and it’s good because Lydia is tired of being the glue that holds her precious darlings, Ms. McCall’s babies together. 

She has plans, that involve calling in an old debt and Jackson might be a bully, a rich kid douche and a little boy hiding in urbanite clothing; but he has stolen Lydia’s heart and she wants it back one way or another. 

The plans involve travel too, seeing the world and getting acquainted with it on a personal level not just from pictures in her mother’s scrapbook. 

Derek watches her more than the others now. Stiles secure in their relationship enough to believe that she will come back but Derek... Derek worries about her and that Jackson will somehow convince her to abandon them. He's known the dark side of love on too personal of a level for her to fool, but of one thing she is sure, she'll never abandon them. 

Her first stray, Stiles, has always known she would leave and from the first day Derek stepped into her home, she had known the time had come. She’d never have been able to leave Stiles without Derek and if some higher power didn’t create those two for each other, well Lydia has only their romance for proof of fate and it’s a mighty powerful one. She’d even bet her finest Jimmy Choo heels that they knew each other in another lifetime, because they’ve never stopped orbiting each other since they met. 

They’ll work the others too. Keep them in line and happy and full of hope. 

Scott needs reminding there isn’t always a pot of gold at the end of rainbows while Allison will need reminding that the rainbow is there, to be marveled at and offer happiness just by existing. And Isaac , who Scott and Allison treasure, will need reminding to go looking for the rainbow. 

Erica and Boyd drive her mad, but they live their happily ever after every day because damn but those two cannot stop fighting over the most ridiculous things ever. Only Erica gets Boyd and his loss of his sister in ways that no one ever has and because no one holds a grudge like Erica does and yet for Boyd, for this family here she forgives anything and fights for them like its everything. 

Lydia thinks they might all be fallen angels, devils who devil-may-care but for each other. They certainly will mess up anyone who dares to hurt one of their own while seemingly immune to the surrounding people who often try to weasel their way into the circle. 

But then again, that’s why she has Stiles. He has the beauty of Gabriel but Lucifer’s tongue. He can speak without guile and comes across so sincere even when he’s being a snarky, smart-ass that his feelings are projected upon whoever is in his direct line of sight. He’s a gift that boy and Lydia is so happy Derek knows it. 

Isaac and Derek might be the most damaged of the bunch, but they fill every empty space in each one of their hearts. 

So once Derek is free of Peter Hale and Kate Argent, Lydia’s going to take back the part of her heart she’s missing, because she’s tired of watching her family grow into balanced, well-adjusted people while she only yearns for her heart, to be her own, wholly again.

**Author's Note:**

> Be warned, that while this story is wholly Human!AU, I attempted to remain as canon compliant as I could to the Teen Wolf story that would translate to this alternate universe which means Kate Argent abused Derek Hale and it is mentioned. Also, Stiles gets beat up by Gerard Argent and also, in a sting operation gone sour. Also, Victoria Argent's suicide is mentioned. Chris Argent speculates about his family's mental health and Gerard's cancer.
> 
> I simply tried to make the human angle of this story work within a scenario that made sense to transplant the Teen Wolf characters into as a character study of who they are and what makes them tick.


End file.
